Moody Monday: the USA does have a king

[mellowtigger]

I guess I was wrong earlier.

The Supreme Court ruled for immunity for the President of the United States for his official acts. Moreover, they ruled that prosecutors must not provide truthful evidence of those official acts in some circumstances, because it might lead juries to convict in the cases where courts still allow prosecution. It's not as thorough as the total immunity I expected them to provide, but it's close enough for any president to do awful, unethical things with impunity. We do have a king, after all.

This SCOTUS blog post is well done. It talks of the specific Trump circumstances that the justices ruled on and how future prosecutors would be limited in their abilities in courtrooms.

It's a power of the President to declare martial law, even separately from Congress. There are some good restrictions on that usage, but they seem to not apply whenever a President decides that domestic violence will happen without it. I mean, maybe a hypothetical President's prognostication about the immediate danger is right, and maybe their opinion is wrong, but if courts are not allowed to arbitrate that decision thanks to official immunity, well... suppose you have a President who lies and does simply what benefits himself by declaring an emergency that isn't really there? What could go wrong?

Comments

[mellowtigger]

P.S. I'm pretty sure martial law means that the normal court system does not function. Afterwards, however, society should reasonably ask if the action was appropriate to the danger. When courts resume, someone should be held accountable for things done during the emergency. Even in war, there are rules. But USA Presidents are now unaccountable in the primary government process that we all learned as children: checks and balances on power. Fun times ahead.

[mallorys_camera]

Yah, that SCOTUS verdict is problematic in just so many ways... Sigh...